With the evening weather forecast giving us the added bonus of another few days of warmth its hard to think of this beautiful summer ever giving up,well that was the case until the other morning, when I found moths that had died due to the cold evening which certainly reminded me of the first frost.

Its fair to say that most moths approaching, dare I say, the lesser months of the year are from the Noctuidae family which tend to be the most difficult to identify, with so many similar looking individuals. The cold evenings have produced dozens of the Flounced Rustic and Shuttle-shaped Darts and alas from memory only two moths have been new. The first is a very grand looking moth that has the name of Feathered Gothic, a robust looking moth I have found it to be rather inactive which has made taking the odd photo a bit of a pleasure. Pugs on show seem to all be about the Double-striped kind but the Common Wainscot has lived more up to its name. Heart & Dart,Square-spot Rustic,The Snout,Vine’s Rustic, large Yellow Underwings in a plethora of different colours but I suppose the one that took me a while to identify turned out to be another of those rarities in NE Hampshire,usually only appearing in the New Forest,turned out to be The Anomolous and how it reached that name I’m missing for the moment.You will note that most moths found in the trap are typically in autumnal colours presumably this gives them the camouflage they require against predation .So that wildlife garden oasis that I keep badgering everyone with has done it again,and I suppose the heathland in this neck of the woods had a large part to play as well. The write-ups continue,slowly, and there will be times when species family names don’t match as I use a foreign site for taxonomic information but hopefully somewhere in the future it will make sense to all of us.

73.253 - Feathered Gothic - THOLERA decimalis (Poda, 1761)

73.113 - Angle Shades - PHLOGOPHORA meticulosa (Linnaeus, 1758)

My first Angle Shades of the year which is rather surprising as I often find the larva very early in the season decimating the Clematis buds.

With very few records here in NE Hampshire The Anomalous was indeed a very lucky find,not in the light trap but tucked up in the corner of a window.

70.081 - Grey Pine Carpet - THERA obeliscata (Hübner, [1787])

70.193 - Lesser Treble-bar - APLOCERA efformata Guenée, [1858]

Lesser Treble-bar or Treble-bar? With all the information i still struggle on the one but lets hope for once I am right.No doubt those that do will put me right.So there you have it a sample of some of the moths certainly appearing in my light trap and I hope you enjoy them.